Why do you think Renet and Savanti Romero were never in the original cartoon?

[Original TMNT Cartoon Fan]

Originally Posted by neatoman

for some reason the episode couldn't decide if he was an alien or from the future. I can see why that could have been a problem for Laird...

He's from circa 400 years into the future (2390 AD), probably also from Earth. It was the US soldiers at the beginning who thought the robot to be some kind of extraterrestrial intruder, and decided to blast it into pieces.